Episode discussion post: "The Great Patriotic War"

[jae]

Aired:
25 April 2018 in the U.S. and Canada

This is a discussion post for episode 605 of The Americans, intended for viewers who are watching the show on the U.S./Canadian schedule. (Feel free to dive in to the discussion even if you're coming in late--and you should also feel free to start a new thread if it seems too daunting to read through what's already been posted first. If you're reading this at a point where you've already seen subsequent episodes, though, please take care to keep comments spoiler-free of anything that comes after season six, episode five.)

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Comments

Re: Elizabeth's Moral Event Horizon

[quantumreality]

I'm pretty sure if Elizabeth was thinking more clearly she'd have realized that there's more than one way to skin a cat.

What's Breland's transportation schedule like? What are his routines at home? Et cetera.

There's almost always an exploitable 30-minute window. Say Breland's cooking supper, so he's got the house alarm off. Say he gets a door-to-door salesperson knocking. He's distracted. Around the back, Philip slips in and grabs the tape, then waits for Breland to go back to cooking. Philip in his turn sneaks back out a side window and is long gone.

Re: Elizabeth's Moral Event Horizon

[saraqael]

Of course, Elizabeth could have just cut to the chase and arranged for Breland to be kidnapped, and not involved Kimmy in the plot at all. This mad scheme of luring Kimmy into Bulgaria and then framing her with drugs and threatening to have her tossed in a commie jail for 20 years ... that was so over the top and convoluted. There was no way that would have worked. Simple is always best. Maybe she kidded herself into thinking that if they could successfully blackmail Breland once because of a threat to Kimmy, then he'd be compromised and be in their pocket forever.